West Brom vs Arsenal Preview, Predicted line up and predicted score by KJ
We finally have a win under our belt against one of the bigger teams in midweek and I expect that to propel us onto better things starting with the game at the Hawthorns.
West Brom are always a bit of a difficult team to beat, especially away from home. They generally have a few good players and they always manage to upset a few of the top teams every season. Hopefully it won’t be us this time round.
Arteta is out for a possible 6 weeks which is a massive blow. He was clearly one of our best players against both United and Dortmund showing how integral his intelligence and passing is to our set up. Now we’ll need to cope with Flamini and that does scare me a bit. None of the players around him are comfortable passing the ball to him as he’s just not very good with it. As a result, pressing players with only Flamini as their passing option is a beneficial tactic for the opposition. Hopefully Ramsey sticks close to the Frenchman to ensure that other players aren’t limited with their passing.
Predicted line up:
Martinez
Chambers – Mertesacker – Monreal – Gibbs
Flamini – Ramsey
Oxlade-Chamberlain – Alexis – Cazorla
Giroud
It’s not too bad of a team considering all the injuries we have and I’m far more confident that we can get a result given our recent performance against Dortmund.
I don’t expect Koscielny to start. He’ll probably make a sub appearance late on to shore up the defence as we try and protect our lead (hopefully).
Ramsey will need to build on his performance against Dortmund with another solid one against West Brom.
Chamberlain and Alexis are in some great form at the moment and I expect them to be at the heart of every attack. Their dynamic pace and agility allows them to ride challenges and to create chances out of nothing.
Giroud could also be a better strike partner for Alexis as the Frenchman will stay close to the Chilean and will look to combine with him as often as possible.
I expect us to finally get back to winning ways in the Premier League. 2 – 0 to Arsenal.